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Kay Adams
Kay Adams was the long-term girlfriend and eventual wife of Michael Corleone, the future Godfather of the Corleone family. She is portrayed by Diane Keaton. Biography Kay was born to Thornton Adams and his wife, two WASPs from New England. As a non-Italian, she was somewhat of an outsider from the beginning and symbolized Michael's initial desire to live a more Americanized life, in contrast to the Corleone family's criminal enterprises. Marriage After Michael kills both Sollozzo and McCluskey in response to the assassination attempt on his father in 1946, he and Kay are separated while he takes refuge in Sicily, where he briefly marries a local girl, Apollonia, who is accidentally killed by a car bomb intended for Michael. He returns to The United States a year later, when he and Kay reunite and marry. Michael becomes the new Don in 1955 after his father's death. Due to Michael's marriage to Apollonia occurring entirely in Sicily, Kay is apparently unaware that Michael was a widower when he married her in the USA. They eventually had two children, Anthony and Mary. When an hysterical Connie accused Michael of orchestrating a wave of murders — including that of her husband, Carlo Rizzi — Kay asks Michael if his sister is telling the truth. Michael denies it, but immediately afterward, Kay sees Michael receiving his caporegimes, and sees Peter Clemenza greet him as "Don Corleone". Kay then realized Connie was telling the truth after all, and her husband has become his father's successor in every way. She initially fled back to New Hampshire with their children, but Tom Hagen persuaded her to return. Upon her return, Kay converted to Catholicism, going to Mass every day to pray for her husband's soul (just as Carmella Corleone had done for Vito). Life in Nevada Kay is still very isolated from the decisions Michael makes as the new Don.During her third pregnancy, she implores Michael to fulfill his promise of legitimizing the family business. Michael makes a sincere effort to break the family's criminal ties, but his escalating war with rival Hyman Roth keep him trapped in the criminal underworld and in his personal obsession with revenge. The Abortion During Michael's trip to Cuba, Kay has an abortion, fearing that another male heir would tie the family to the Mafia forever. While she initially tells Michael that it was a miscarriage, she is increasingly repulsed by the campaign of murder and terror he wages in his war with Roth, and she reveals the truth to him during an argument. Enraged, he banishes her from the family; the two are soon divorced. Initially, Michael retained custody of the children, but after Fredo Corleone's murder, he relinquished them to Kay. A New Life By 1979, Kay and Michael have not been in contact for several years, and Kay has remarried to Douglas Michelson, a lawyer. Michael has extracted himself from criminal enterprises and has even sold the casinos, and he has been given an honor comparable to knighthood by the Pope, in recognition of his charitable work. After an uneasy reunion, the two reconcile their differences and begin to rekindle their relationship after Michael retires and appoints his nephew Vincent the new Don. Michael reluctantly consents to permit their son, Anthony, to become an opera singer. Just as they begin a new life together, however, their daughter, Mary is killed in an assassination attempt on Michael. This tragedy breaks Michael's spirit, and he withdraws from Kay and from life itself until his lonely death in 1997. Category: Corleones